VacationSelector
White sand and the turquoise Gulf of Mexico, Gulf Shores
Gulf ShoresWhite sand and the turquoise Gulf of Mexico
The Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock, Petra
PetraThe Treasury, Al-Khazneh, cut into the rock

Photos: Gulf Shores by ourgulfshoresvacation.com, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped; Petra by Yasir Gürbüz, Pexels License.

Gulf Shores or Petra?

Our verdict in twelve categories, each scored against the same fixed benchmark cities, and the climate month by month, so you can choose for your trip.

Choose Gulf Shores for

  • beaches
  • families
  • nightlife

What lies behind each score is written up on Gulf Shores’s own page.

Choose Petra for

  • culture and sights
  • nature and the outdoors
  • getting around

What lies behind each score is written up on Petra’s own page.

Scoreboard

Twelve categories on one fixed scale from 0 to 100. The shaded stretch is the gap between the two.

Beaches & swimming. Gulf Shores 84, Petra 5: Gulf Shores leads by 79 points.
Food & drink. Gulf Shores 38, Petra 22: Gulf Shores leads by 16 points.
Culture & sights. Gulf Shores 12, Petra 85: Petra leads by 73 points.
Nightlife. Gulf Shores 32, Petra 5: Gulf Shores leads by 27 points.
Nature & outdoors. Gulf Shores 52, Petra 78: Petra leads by 26 points.
Day trips. Gulf Shores 52, Petra 30: Gulf Shores leads by 22 points.
Good for families. Gulf Shores 75, Petra 25: Gulf Shores leads by 50 points.
Getting around. Gulf Shores 15, Petra 25: Petra leads by 10 points.
Shopping & style. Gulf Shores 22, Petra 18: Gulf Shores leads by 4 points.
Affordability. Gulf Shores 42, Petra 45: Petra leads by 3 points.
Live music & performing arts. Gulf Shores 27, Petra 10: Gulf Shores leads by 17 points.
Wellness & relaxation. Gulf Shores and Petra are level on 28.
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What lies behind each score is written up on the two cities’ own pages: Gulf Shores and Petra.

Your match

Pick a travel style or drag the sliders, and both match scores follow your weighting.

Gulf Shores
Best match
40match

Wins on beaches and families with your weighting.

Petra
31match

Wins on culture and sights and nature and the outdoors with your weighting.

What matters to you?

When should you go?

Pick your month. The climate figures are measured averages, not a forecast.

Gulf Shores in July

32 °Cdaytime high
24 °Cnight-time low
165 mmrain in the month
No recordsunshine a day
29 °Csea
14 hdaylight a day

Petra in July

35 °Cdaytime high
19 °Cnight-time low
0 mmrain in the month
12 hsunshine a day
No seasea
14 hdaylight a day

Daytime high, °C

0°10°20°30°40°JFMAMJJASOND

Rainfall in the month, mm

050100150200250JFMAMJJASOND
Gulf ShoresPetra

Where the figures come from

Gulf Shores has no rain gauge within 25 km of the centre, so its rainfall comes from a gridded climate dataset read at the city rather than from a gauge further away.

Petra's temperatures are measured 34 km from the centre, at Ma'An.

Petra's station stands 219 m above the city centre, so the centre is likely a little warmer than the figures say.

Petra has no rain gauge within 25 km of the centre, so its rainfall comes from a gridded climate dataset read at the city rather than from a gauge further away.

Temperature and rainfall are climate normals, averaged over the years shown. Gulf Shores: 2006-2020 (rainfall 1991-2020) normals, Gulf Shores / Bay Village Mobile Home Park (3.7 km from centre). Petra: 1991-2020 normals, Ma'An (33.9 km from centre).

Before you go

MeasureGulf ShoresPetra
Official language-Arabic
CurrencyUS Dollar (USD)Jordanian Dinar (JOD)
SocketsAB120 V, 60 HzBCFGJ230 V, 50 Hz
Driving sideRightRight
Time zoneUTC-6, UTC-5 in summerUTC+3
Emergency number911911
Elevation2 m850 m
Main airportPensacola International Airport (PNS)54 km from centre27 non-stop destinationsKing Hussein International Airport (AQJ)90 km from centre5 non-stop destinations
Public holidays this year13 days-

By the numbers

MeasureGulf ShoresPetra
City population15,014-
People per km²207-
Museums within 10 km12
UNESCO World Heritage sites within 50 km01
Swim season, months above 21 °C8 months-

Where else could you go?

Every comparison below shares a destination with this one, so you can follow Gulf Shores or Petra somewhere new.

Browse every destination

Sources

Structured data from Wikidata (CC0). Weather data by Meteostat. Meteorological data provided by NOAA, DWD and others. Rainfall where no rain gauge is within 25 km is from the TerraClimate 1991-2020 climatology (Abatzoglou et al. 2018, Scientific Data), read at the city. Sea surface temperature from NOAA OISST v2.1, NOAA Physical Sciences Laboratory. Airport data from OurAirports (public domain). Public holidays from Nager.Date (MIT). Exchange rates via Frankfurter, based on European Central Bank reference rates. Non-stop route lists from the "Airlines and destinations" tables on English Wikipedia airport articles, by Wikipedia contributors, reused under CC BY-SA 4.0. Currency from the ISO 4217 register maintained by SIX, cross-checked against country data from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0). Price level from World Bank open data (PPP conversion factor for private consumption and official exchange rate), CC BY 4.0. Time zones from GeoNames (CC BY 4.0); clock offsets computed from the IANA time zone database. Daylight hours computed from each destination's latitude using the NOAA solar position algorithm.

Category scores are our editorial verdict under rubric v3, each placed against the same fixed benchmark cities; the climate figures are measured. How the scores are set. Snapshot generated 2026-11-02. Daily budgets are estimates from country price levels.